Is The Enquirer Next?

The
Cincinnati Enquirer's parent company is testing a “pay wall”
system at three of its newspapers as it attempts to devise a business
model that involves users paying for Internet content.

If
successful, the model being implemented at the Tallahassee
Democrat in Florida, The
Greenville News in South Carolina and The
Spectrum in St. George, Utah, eventually could be implemented
at Cincinnati's only surviving daily newspaper.

All
the newspapers are owned by The Gannett Co., based in McLean, Va.

According
to a report on Poynter
Online, a journalism industry Web site, the
fee for online-only content is $9.95 a month; the cost for Web access
bundled with a print subscription varies by market. In
Tallahassee, seven-day home delivery (with Web access) costs $20,
while an online day pass costs $2.

Kate
Marymont, news vice president for Gannett's Community Publishing
Division, told a Poynter
writer that "we know this is not the
model, this is a small-scale test."

Gannett
hasn't yet decided on the approach for its other markets, a company
spokeswoman said, but that the firm will use what it learns from the
test sites "to help us develop our long-term strategy for paid
content."